


Shuura

by Quiet_Shadow



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canonical Character Death, F/M, Family Dynamics, Gen, Handmaidens, Past Relationship(s), Training, hinted pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-31
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-10-01 13:10:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17244815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quiet_Shadow/pseuds/Quiet_Shadow
Summary: Out there, there is a universe where Leia Organa has Clones around her when she’s growing up.It's not her story, though.For, in this universe, Luke Skywalker grows up on Tatooine surrounded by another fiercely loyal group whose members have sworn to protect their Queen/Senator’s Son. They are the Naboo Royal Handmaidens, and he is Padmé Amidala Naberrie's son; and who better than his Aunts can educate him?





	Shuura

**Author's Note:**

> Last year (or was it two years ago? I can't remember...), I saw something pass on my Tumblr dashboard, a story on what Leia would have been like if she had grown up surrounded by Clones. And while I loved that story for it was really great, I couldn't help but wonder 'what about Luke?'. Now, I saw plenty of stories where he was raised by Clones, but stories where Padmé's Handmaidens raise him? I could scarcely remember any.
> 
> And they're such great characters too, when you think about it!
> 
> So I wrote this. Here's hoping you'll like <3

Out there, there is a universe where Leia Organa has Clones around her when she’s growing up. Clones who teach her to shoot, to fight, to fall, to fly. They train her and aren’t surprised when they discover she’s the daughter of General Skywalker – if anything, it reinforces their loyalty to her. When she grows up and doesn’t want to be a politician, wants to be part of the Rebellion and realizes she could be Force-Sensitive, someone manages to get her in contact with Fulcrum and soon, there is a young Padawan trailing eagerly behind a familiar-looking Togruta, working on making her first then her second lightsaber and soaking up knowledge of the Force like a sponge while keeping her aim and her piloting skills sharp, much to the cheer and approbation of the Clones.

It is beautiful and awesome to contemplate. But the story isn’t over yet, for there is another person whose fate is slightly different in this universe. While Leia grows up surrounded by fiercely loyal, badass clones who have sworn to protect their General’s Daughter and more-or-less secretly teach her to kick asses, Luke Skywalker grows up on Tatooine surrounded by another fiercely loyal group who have sworn to protect their Queen/Senator’s Son.

Because Padmé Amidala’s Handmaidens were badass in their own right and at least two of them, Moteé and Ellé, were aware that Amidala was both secretly married and pregnant since the very beginning, before they shared the tale with the others when they gathered together to weep. Someone had to prepare Padmé’s body for the funeral and made it appears as if she was still pregnant when she died, and who better to the task than her faithful Handmaidens, who always protected her and guarded her secrets? They did so with tears in their eyes and broken hearts, wondering about the child. Do they live? Did they died?

It’s hard to participate in the funeral, to walk along Theed’s streets bearing her casket. They’re all here, past and present Handmaidens. Even the dead stand by their sides, in the discreet holos Dormé and Sabé keep in the large sleeves of their robes; nobody should miss the last goodbye to their beloved Queen, and perhaps deep down they hope the ones who left already (Cordé, Versé, do you see? Are you with her now, protecting her until we cross over as well to join your ranks?) are waiting to greet her on the other side.

Padmé Amidala Naberrie is dead, but she’s still as beautiful as ever, and it takes all their combined strength not to wail at the unfairness that is her death. Her very mysterious death, for no one seems to know HOW she died.

She’s dead, and her child disappeared and nobody will tell them what the fuck happened. They want to rage and scream and ask for answers from anyone, everyone.

But the Handmaidens of Padmé Amidala Naberrie have spent years in the shadow of the Queen, standing by her side in Theed or flanking her on the Senate’s floor. Moteé was by her side and Senator Bail Organa when liberty died under thunderous applauses. They know not everything is at it seems in the new Galactic Empire. They were there when the Jedi were declared traitors by the Emperor.

They don’t need to hear more to know that the child of a Jedi would be in terrible danger should he come to the eye of the Emperor and his growing legion of Inquisitors. Children aren’t safe (the ones in the Temple hadn’t been). Amidala’s death is suspicious in itself, even if Imperial officials refuse all attempts to probe at the cause of Naboo’s beloved former Queen. The Handmaidens need no further reason to hold their tongue and never breathe a word of Amidala’s secret marriage, even to her parents. They don’t know if the child survived. Ryoo Thule does, for she saw the body and oversaw their work as per Naboo’s custom, but her daughter and son-in-law don’t have that comfort.  
(And soon Ryoo Thule dies too, and they know it’s a dangerous secret to hold.)

It breaks Sabé and Dormé’s heart to lie to them. It crushes Miré and Umé’s souls to witness how devastated the Naberries are over the death of their child. But their grief would be even bigger should anything happen to their unknown, unsuspected grandchild.

They need to think of the child first and foremost, for they are the Queen’s Handmaiden, and if they failed to save the mother, they won’t allow any harm to ever come to her legacy.

They regroup; they confer together in secret outside of Theed and progressively, off their beloved planet of Naboo. Nobody pay them much attention as they depart one by one or by pair. They were only Handmaidens, after all, and nobody pay much attention to a Queen or a Senator’s ladies-in-waiting, too focused on their Mistress’ charisma. Queen Apailana doesn’t need their services, having her own faithful attendants to protect her.

Bit by bit, they all leave for the vastness of space in search of Padmé’s legacy, for they are smart enough to realize that whoever took the child, they wouldn’t have let them on Naboo: Sabé, Eirtaé, Miré, Umé, Ellé, Moteé, Sabé, Dormé, Rabé, Hollé, Fé, Saché, Yané and even Dané, who only underwent a year of training with them and never officially became an Handmaiden to Amidala. They don’t fully trust her, but she knew Amidala, and Dané has connections the other Handmaidens can only dream about. They need her to find Padmé’s son.

Because they’re certain her child is a boy.

More than once, Amidala referred to the baby as a boy in Ellé and Moteé’s earshot, and they don’t need more to know their Mistress was going to have a son.

True, it had never been more than a feeling since Padmé never had it confirmed, but in grief a feeling easily turn to a certitude.

They seek a boy and discard the possibility Padmé had a daughter, or that she might have more than one child.

When they learn Senator Bail Organa adopted a girl with brown eyes and brown hair, they don’t pay much attention to the news. They’re too busy seeking a boy who could look like one or both of his parents. They whispered between them, wondering if he will have Padmé’s eyes or her smile.

It takes them time and many false leads before they arrive on Tatooine and head for the Lars homestead. Sabé is the first, she always is, but the others are only a few steps behind. Little Luke watch them come in one by one with wide eyes, and the Handmaidens watch him with wider eyes in turn. Their Queen’s child is beautiful. He has his father’s blue eyes and blond hair bleached by the twin suns of Tatooine, but his smile is his mother’s, and his gentleness is hers as well.

Umé and Miré are the last to arrive, and when they do only then Luke grows enough courage to ask the whole group if they are angels.

They’re not, they reply. They’re his Aunts.

(For they were Padmé’s sisters as much as Sola was and so, so much more. Aunts is what they are in their heart and Aunts they will be for the little boy Padmé bore and brought into the world.)

Luke is surprisingly okay with the explanation.

Owen and Beru Lars are less so, but it’s not like they can push the young ladies out on their lonesome; they’re clearly outnumbered (and it’s not like the Handmaidens are threatening or anything; they’re invariably polite and considerate and they help around the house and do their share of work and growing grumpy or not, Owen doesn’t have it in him to chase away family, even if they’re not blood related. But then again, family rarely is on Tatooine).

And neither can Ben Kenobi convince them to leave when Owen grudgingly decides to contact him so he can deal with the situation. Sabé and Dormé, who have known him the longest, like him too much to aim a blaster at his face when he kindly suggests they should leave, and Eirtaé, Fé, Saché, Rabé and Yané respect him too much for his role in liberating Naboo from the Trade Federation’s invasion all those years ago to just spit and curse at him, but it’s close. Ellé and Moteé snarl at him, Umé, Miré and Hollée use swear words respectful Handmaidens should never had used and Dané’s smile is betraying her intention to just say ‘to hell with that’ and shoot him right there.

Obi-Wan doesn’t quite give up, but he gradually drops the subject.

(And perhaps he mutters under his breath that stubbornness must have been something Amidala had looked up to when the time had come for her to pick her Handmaidens.)

The Handmaiden stay, and Luke gains an army of Aunts and teachers rolled in one, devoted to his happiness and safety – not that he realizes it. They’re his Aunts, like Beru, and in his childlike’s innocence, he thinks all Aunts are like his.

He doesn’t even realize he’s being given a princely education.

(Obi-Wan does and does not protest, when faced with an army of young ladies hell-bent on having the son of Padmé as well-educated as his late mother. He won’t stop them to try and shape Luke into a politician, if they don’t stop him from trying to shape him up like a Jedi when the time comes.)

(Some conversations they have are ugly, though. But they stay out of the farm. Luke has no need to known of the underlying tension.)

(Luke is the son of a former Queen and Senator and of a Jedi. Both paths are his by birthright. The Handmaidens are reluctant to let him follow the path of the Force, because look where the Force led Anakin Skywalker? There are screams and shouts and shrieks and tears, or so many tears when they manage to pry the truth out of Obi-Wan’s throat, because their beloved Padmé died by the hand of a husband she loved with all her soul. A husband she loved too much, and who loved her too much in turn. The last person in the universe who should and would have hurt her, they all thought.)

(They had been wrong.)

(Suddenly, Jedi trying not to let emotions rule them make an awfully lot more of sense, if it must be the end result.)

(There is a lot of quietness when the last cry fades into the night. Then someone says, under the cover of the dark, that had they been in Obi-Wan’s place on Mustafar, they wouldn’t have just let Anakin Skywalker burn on the bank: they would have thrown him in the lava themselves, after emptying the charger of their blaster right between his two yellow, hateful eyes. Everyone agrees quietly, and there are a lot of hard looks thrown in.)

(Jedi don't believe in revenge. Handmaidens are no Jedi, and there is nothing quite as dark and dangerous as the fury of a woman scorned.)

(Luke has the Force, Obi-Wan says quietly in the same night. He has to be trained someday, so he knows the dangers of walking a path similar to his Father.)

(So let his Aunts first train him to be a better man than Anakin Skywalker ever was, they answer him when they finally reach a decision over wherever or not Luke will one day be a Jedi. Let his Aunts shape him into being the son of his Mother, then let him decide by himself if the Force is what he wants.)

(Obi-Wan doesn’t object.)

(They’d have buried him in the sands of Tatooine if he had tried.)

Luke is four when Yané start sitting with him in the evenings and start teaching him how to play various instruments. He’s playing scales on wooden flutes and three-stringed guitars between two lessons of solfège and learns traditional Naboo melodies along with Tatooine songs. Dané teaches him a few rowdy ones behind everyone’s back with his pinky promise he won’t sing them wherever one of the other Handmaidens can hear them.

(He does anyway, by accident most of the time, and Dané has to run very fast when he does, even if she’s laughing too much for that.)

At six, Luke speaks and writes fluent Basic, Gunganese and High Galactic. Rabé promises to teach him Sullustese when he’s older, which he’s looking forward to. Old Ben Kenobi, who sometimes drops at the farm or whom his Aunts go to bring supplies out there in the Wastes, mentions that if Luke continues progressing like he does, he’ll someday teach him how to speak Twi’leki and how to understand Shyriiwook.

In the meanwhile, Luke is learning Ithorese at a fast rate and knows a few basic sentences in Rodese, and his teachers’ eyes shine with pride whenever he repeats them dutifully with barely the trace of an accent in his speech. They’re a little less shiny whenever he swears in Huttese or when they discover Dané, always the less reputable one of their little family, went behind their collective back to teach him how to play Sabacc. Luke pouts when they veto any trip to Mos Espa or Mos Eisley to test his skills.

At seven, they start giving him lessons on politics, which makes Obi-Wan sighs like a long-suffering man, but Luke takes to it with easiness. The Handmaidens taught him to listen since he was a toddler, and listen Luke does, paying attention to conversations even when he doesn’t look like it. He’s quick to analyze arguments and to formulate appropriates and thoughtful, appeasing answers. He doesn’t have Padmé’s talent for spontaneous and passionate speeches, but he has her caring personality and a genuine want to help people no matter what it takes.

At eight, Luke starts learning self-defense, how to break a hold and duck under an arm, how to throw someone over his shoulder while using his assailant’s strength against them and how to sweep his foot just right to make them fall to the floor. Eirtaé and Umé show Luke to hide a weapon or a transmitter in his clothes without being noticed while Fé and Yané teach him what clothes to pick and wear to pass unnoticed in a crowd. Sabé and Rabé, who are the best shots among the Handmaidens, take him asides to give him shooting lessons. They soon learn Luke is a natural shot with a blaster – perhaps too natural, so of course it doesn’t take long before a delegation consisting of Dormé, Ellé, Moteé and Miré is off to drag the reluctant Obi-Wan Kenobi to the homestead for a more permanent stay so he can start teaching Luke about the Force and the sooner the better, thank you.

(It’s much sooner than they would have all liked, but perhaps it is for the best. Luke takes everything in stride and promises not to show off what he can do and what Obi-Wan teach him to other children. It’s a promise he keeps, despite the temptation. Though he has to admit sheepishly perhaps Maaten’s laces didn’t undo by themselves when the bigger boy tried to run after him to smash his fist into Luke’s face.)

(Obi-Wan doesn’t teach him how to use a lightsaber, though. Luke is too young, he says. The Handmaidens veto it – and Beru and Owen as well. Luke doesn’t try to force the issue, because he’s a good kid. He learns meditations instead, and philosophies and old tales Anakin was often too impatient and busy to truly listen to. He asks insightful questions and receives as truthful answers as possible and Obi-Wan’s lips twitch every so often because Anakin certainly never tried to use those arguments with him.)

At nine, Luke sneaks off to fly on old speeder bikes. Padmé Amidala’s son he might be, but he’s also Anakin Skywalker’s son and the former Jedi is bound to make an apparition every now and there.

The Handmaidens aren’t amused, and neither is Obi-Wan, who had thought well-behaved Luke wouldn’t give him as many grey hair as his Father. On the plus side, Luke starts learning Mon Calamarian on top of Sullustese and Gran and he’s getting a good hang on Twi’leki thank to Obi-Wan’s lessons; Huttesse doesn’t really count because everyone speaks it on Tatooine. His blond hairs have become quite long for a human male, and Rabé teaches him how to pull them into elaborate hairstyles fitting for a boy (and Dané, Moteé and Umé teach him how to hide little things in those hairstyles too, because why not? After all, people always forget to check the hair and a hairpin can make a deadly weapon when well-used). She tries not to cry as she remembers doing the same thing for the boy’s Mother and Luke, always the caring, quick-to-notice child, hugs her silly before she can even let a sob out. Then, for good measure, he goes around and hugs every single one of his Aunts (and Obi-Wan, whose mouth drops open before he tentatively hugs him back).

At ten, Luke is often found bend over pieces of machinery, tinkering with broken droids and ship parts and trying to put them back in order, face streaked with grease and oil as he concentrates on his task while answering the questions of his Aunts, who make sure he keeps up with his education. He looks a lot like Anakin did at this age and Obi-Wan’s breath sometimes shorten when he watches him.

Luke doesn’t ask questions on his Father. He has learned plenty about his Mother and her years of girlhood among his Aunts and he cherishes the memory of a woman he will never meet, as unfair as it is. He knows his Father has been a Jedi, knows that the Jedi are almost all dead asides of Obi-Wan and a few lucky ones, hidden somewhere among the stars. He has enough tact to know it hurts his Uncle to speak about it, even now, and can guess the reason his Father isn’t raising him is because he’s dead like all the others. Obi-Wan promises he’ll tell him more about Anakin Skywalker someday, when he’s ready.

(He doesn’t precise wherever it is when Luke will be ready or when **Obi-Wan** himself will be ready, the little boy notes to himself with interest.)

(Perhaps there is more to Anakin Skywalker’s death than first thought, he thinks.)

(Obi-Wan has promised, though, and Luke knows he means to keep his promise. He just needs to be patient.)

(Just like he’s patient enough to wait until he’s of age before Obi-Wan accept to teach him how to use a lightsaber, should he wish to.)

All in one, Luke is growing into a remarkable child. Perhaps a little too remarkable, the Handmaidens finally decide among themselves as Luke reaches puberty. Standing out in a court or on the Senate’s floor was always something Padmé was good at. But Padmé’s safety had always been in number – and Luke’s will be too.

There is no shortage of blond human boys among Tatooine’s population, as they soon find out. By the time Luke is ten, there are at least five other boys running around the Lars homestead, all more or less closely resembling Luke. Luke isn’t his Mother, and he’s not a Naboo politician, but Dormé, Miré, Ellé, Moteé and Umé will be caught dead before they allow him to come to harm because he doesn’t have a good decoy on whom to rely to sneak around or avoid assassinations.

(And because he is his Mother’s son, because he is his Father’s son, there will always be people after him, so a boy among a sea of decoys is what he needs to become.)

Some are mechanics or moisture farmers’ sons, some are slaves the Handmaidens rescued one by one and who decided to devote themselves to the dark haired ladies and their young charge, who’s a friendly boy with a easy smile they all soon grown to care about more than about their own lives. They can’t be called Handmaidens, but Sabé and Dormé and Ellé and Moteé and Umé and Miré and Hollé and Yané and Rabé and Eirtaé watch them with pride and no small amount of nostalgia because they remind them of another time, another life. They’re Luke’s Aids, his Guardians.

(All Luke is missing now is a pseudonym, and he’s already thinking about it.)

Dage is taller than Luke and will always be so, Zakee’s hairs are curly, Agim’s skin is much darker while his hair are a shade paler, Konall is thin and wiry, Tihjian is stockier and his eyes are as green as Luke’s are blue. And all are learning fencing and how to properly use a lightsaber because honestly, Obi-Wan, they can’t act like proper decoy if they don’t know how to use those damn things!

Obi-Wan doesn’t bother to point out that anyone reaching with the Force will find who is the real Luke and who isn’t; that argument never worked before and he doubts it ever will. Darth Vader and the Emperor asides, there aren’t many people gifted in the Force left in the Empire (there are the Inquisitors, of course, but nobody like to think about them). Of course, so long they don’t get a chance to truly feel Luke’s real presence, then he’s more or less safe – and for the average soldier, a man with a lightsaber is a Jedi, even if they don’t have the Force, so maybe it can work.

So he teaches the group of young boys the best he can, and if his heart feels lighter, he doesn’t tell anyone.

(Dané and Fé and Saché and Eirtaé and Dormé and Rabé and well, everyone notice, really. They have eyes to see what isn’t obvious, it’s part of their job and part of the reason they survived so long as Padmé’s Handmaidens. So perhaps, when Dané takes off again in her ship, she tries to keep an eye and a ear out for rumors of small or bigger children who can do things that other children can’t do, because perhaps, just perhaps Obi-Wan would like to have other students, students who could use the Force.)

(Perhaps she does, and perhaps she doesn’t. Who can say, with Dané and her secretive smiles?)

(And perhaps, just perhaps sometimes, a Handmaiden goes to spend the night in the hermit’s house, and perhaps she tries or doesn’t try to seduce him. They’re still young enough to bear a child and Obi-Wan is desirable, a good man despite the mistakes he may have done – but they’re hardly blameless either in the mess that became Anakin Skywalker and Padmé Amidala Naberrie’s love story, for perhaps, if they had opened their mouth…)

(Obi-Wan would be a good father, they all think to themselves. Obi-Wan is a father already, they also think when they watch him with Luke and the other boys, watching the night sky and pointing out stars. Perhaps they try or they don’t try to seduce him, and perhaps Obi-Wan fends off or doesn’t fend off their advances, because loneliness is an awful weight to bear in the end and he’s just a man.)

(Perhaps he cries a name in the night, sometimes, the name of someone long dead, for whom he’d had left the Order should she have asked him to. And perhaps his partner doesn’t mind, because what they have isn’t the deep, possessive love that defined Amidala and Skywalker’s relationship but a simpler kind of love, born from growing companionship and need and trust over having raised one, two, three… six children together. They want companionship, and perhaps a child of their own, the chance to experiment an aspect of motherhood they haven't before. They’re not looking for a whirlwind romance. They’re too old to believe in fairy tales coming true.)

(Fairy tales princesses end up like Padmé, crushed and dead dead dead…)

(Perhaps one belly or two start to swell, and Obi-Wan’s gaze starts to be dazed because…)

(He’s Jedi. He can’t be a Father.)

(You already are, a familiar ghost points out at him between two chuckles. Obi-Wan throws rocks at him until he leaves, but he can't chase the laugher.)

When Luke is eleven, one of Owen Lars’ neighbors pays him a visit to ‘kindly’ ask him why his nephew and his little gang of delinquents saw fit to organize the moisture farmers’ children into a Union and seriously, what the hell is that child, Lars? Owen just looks at him bleakly while in the house, the Handmaidens are cheering loudly for a job well-done and Obi-Wan, ever the long suffering Uncle, sighs and raise a glass with them because why not? It’s not like he’s surprised. If anything, he expected it sooner. At eleven, Padmé was already getting ready to be elected Princess of Theed. If anything, he’s just happy there are no elections on Tatooine because of course Luke would win them by a landslide.

Perhaps his eyes wander on a larger than normal belly, at the promise of a child who will be born soon, a boy or a girl who may or may not be gifted with the Force, but who will be trained like a Handmaiden no matter what Obi-Wan says (not that he will really mind).

Or perhaps they wander toward Luke, with his satisfied smile, face painted white and hair done in an elaborate hairstyle he seems to favor above all other, surrounded by similarly dressed boys who look just as satisfied as him over their efforts. In a few years time, Luke will be old enough to decide to join the Rebellion – and he will, of course, there is no doubt in anyone’s mind about. And when he decides to, they will follow him, for he is their Nephew, he is Padmé’s son, and even if he now has his own guard (always growing, now that they added Maak and Olyan and Daeron), they’re still Handmaidens, they’re still his Aunts. They’re still his family, and family protects each other.

They dread it, the moment he’ll choose to take up arms, but they are also so proud of him, of the man he’s growing up to be, neither Jedi nor politician, a bit of both and perhaps wiser for it. And they weep, because Padmé Amidala Naberrie should have seen it, the light-bringer her son has grown up to be for so many of them.

Luke isn’t his Mother, the Handmaidens have long since realized and accepted, but he has her heart, her compassion and her determination.

And it can’t make his Aunts happier.

When Darth Vader tracks down a particularly inventive and secretive Rebel cell which has been a thorn in the local Governor’s side, he can only stare at this sun-haired boy wearing a crown of blond breads above a face painted as white as the Queens of Naboo and bringing out the blue of his eyes, lower lip split in two by the Scar of Remembrance. There is a suspiciously familiar lump in his sleeve, and there are rumors Obi-Wan recently visited this particular cell and might still be here. Darth Vader had thought he’d meet his former Master, or perhaps a new Padawan.

“Who are you?” he asks, confused by the presence of this strange apparition who keeps a blaster aimed at him as he stands alongside three women he dimly recognizes as having once been Handmaidens to Queen Amidala – they still look like her, despite the passing years. The boy doesn’t look like a Jedi, doesn’t look like he could be Anakin Skywalker brother-Padawan, even if he may or may not have a lightsaber hidden up the sleeve of his tunic.

“Shuura,” is what he says.

Darth Vader was Anakin Skywalker, and Anakin Skywalker remembers a lot of things about his late wife’s home planet and its flora. Her own niece had been named after a flower. “Like the Naboo fruit?” is what he asks in turn. (The name was chosen by Luke because he remembers the tales of his Aunts about his Mother’s favorite fruit, with its yellow and cream colors and its sweet taste. Didn’t they often call him ‘as sweet as shuura’ when he was a child?)

Luke beams. He can't go proclaim around he's Padmé Amidala or Anakin Skywalker's son for safety reasons, which he understands perfectly. He has grown up in the sands of Tatooine but wants to acknowledge the part of him which is purely Naboo. It's good to know someone recognize it right away. “Yes,” he says, and shoots his blaster.


End file.
